[NYE Party] happy new year and lots of fun

[nascensibility]

Who: EVERYONE, but especially you!
Where: Wonderland Ballroom
When: New Year's Eve
Rating: PG - PG13 (will change if applicable)
Summary: New Year's Eve Party
The Story:

[ Previously in the month all residents received an invitation to a formal event: a black tie affair to ring in the New Year. The ballroom and adjacent areas are decked out for the party starting at eight o'clock sharp, meticulously planned and executed, glittering décor to match the no doubt glittering attire as music pours into the halls from the dance floor.

Bars flank each side, service for all manner of alcohol unless a minor requests something, and the primary setting stage features an enormous clock for the countdown. ]




[ Where will you be when the clock strikes midnight? ]

Comments

[mucked]

[ funny, really. because she's just as relieved -- and utterly convinced that it's her, totally her. but part of that is because she's sort of seeing someone. slyly, at least. ]

You and me both. I'd love to be back there. [ a pause; a sigh. ] It's a shame, really. You arrived just in time to miss one of the city's most vocal supporters. He left shortly before you arrived.

[scoutsniper]

Yeah. A lot of New York is probably damn glad I'm not there right now.

[ Mostly bad guys, that is. ]

Yeah? Anyone I'd know?

[mucked]

[ normally, she'd never say his name. it hurts too much and still. but there's something to how natasha talked about frank castle, earlier, that makes peggy inclined to test out the man's reaction. ]

Hard to say. I suppose it depends on what world you're from. [ her head tilts. ] Does the name Steve Rogers sound at all familiar?

[ because if he's a new yorker from any given world where steve existed, she can't help but think the name would ring a bell. ]

[scoutsniper]

[Oh, he's been set right on all that stuff. Even tried to apologize to Tony about it. In his own way. Which Tony had rebuffed. In his own way.]

A little. Yeah. Think my kid wanted a lunchbox.

[mucked]

Yes. I'm told those remain quite popular through the following decades.

[ -- her chin dips. peggy allows herself a note of true vulnerability before powering through. shaking it off. ]

He was here, in Wonderland, for some time. But I knew him back home as well. [ a beat. ] To see New York through his eyes was to fall in love with the city. I'm certain of it.

[scoutsniper]

[It takes him a minute to string the pieces together, because, Christ--it's hard enough realizing that the world you thought you knew wasn't what you knew, and then, well, all of this place. Yeah, give him a second here. ]

Aw, shit. I'm sorry. [That he's not here anymore, that he probably went through some fucked up shit while he was here..all of the above.] New York's kind of like a virus. It gets in you, good and bad.

[mucked]

Don't be. [ sorry. ] Although I must say I've only met people from two worlds, maybe three at most, where Steve Rogers's name means anything to them.

[ she presses through her pain and her grief by focusing on the puzzle at hand. ]

Is there anyone else here, in Wonderland, from your home?

[scoutsniper]

His name probably means a lot more to my kids than me.

[Meant. Though his kids still probably thought he was a hero, he hadn't, you know, fought weird ass space aliens.]

Stark. I think. [Still not a fan, and it's still mutual.] Not sure that's a good or bad thing.

[mucked]

Tony Stark? [ who else? but it's worth the clarification. ] If you and he possibly share a world, Mister Castle, then so possibly do you and I.

[ -- something she suspected already, but only because of romanoff's hints. ]

Stark's father is a good friend of mine. Back home.

[scoutsniper]

Yeah, that guy. Some kind of millionaire genius or something. [Frank would add 'jerk' to that 'something' but he's trying to be nice. Stark did apparently save New York. ]

I hope he and his dad were nothing alike.

[mucked]

Or something.

[ she echoes. already, she can begin to read between the lines and find the subtext suggestive that castle isn't keen on tony. and, truthfully, peggy can't blame him for that. if it hadn't been for the funny sort of familial connection at play she rather doubts she'd be much keen on him either.

and it's not like howard was a perennially well-liked creature back in the '40s either. ]

It's a mixed bag. Howard Stark is also rather too clever for his own good. Although also markedly less morose.

[scoutsniper]

[She probably doesn't have to use much skill to read between those lines. Even when Frank tried to be nice to Tony...it hadn't gone well. And it had hurt him almost physically just doing that. ]

If he doesn't feel the need to tell everyone he's better'n me, he's a damn sight better than his son.

[Though Frank's got 'morose' pretty well cornered himself.]

[mucked]

[ tony wears his insecurity on his sleeve -- although it certainly presents like over-confidence. like overreach. but peggy won't be saying so. she has, after all, at least a through-line of loyalty.

instead: ]

Megalomania might actually run in the blood when it comes to the Starks. They're -- an acquired taste. I'll not deny it.

[scoutsniper]

Probably so.

And I've got to admit, this place doesn't give people a lot of opportunities to show the better sides of themselves.

[Even him, though the good side of him is probably a pretty tiny facet at this point.]

[mucked]

Many of us certainly start out combative. Some doubtless stay so.

[ and then there's tony stark. what she could say in favour would be too personal in nature, so she'll settle for not rising to his defense at all. tony's a big boy; he doesn't need his 'aunt' running interference for him. ]

[scoutsniper]

You don't stay combative here, it means this place is taking your edge.

[Frank, combative to the end. And then some.]

[mucked]

[ a huff of breath -- almost laughter. ]

That's not the sort of combative I'm talking about. [ not the sort that has anything to do with real combat, that is. ] More like -- a standoffishness, I suppose. The sort of behaviour that drives a man to attend something like this and then spend the whole night looking sour about it.

[ her attention doesn't turn on tony, just then, but she sure as hell knows where he's standing and glowering at that very moment. ]

[scoutsniper]

[ Look, 'combative' is sort of in Frank's job description, the official and the unofficial one. ]

You trying to give me a hint or something here?

[Because he might be guilty of, uh, just that. ]

[mucked]

You're certainly welcome to take a hint -- should you feel you need one.

[ a very careful answer. not because she's worried about telling him the truth -- far from it. but because she'd never meant it as an aspersion cast on him, so now she's curious about why he'd read himself into what was originally a dig at tony. ]

But, truthfully, you seem to be managing. You took a seat here, didn't you?

[ not quite so people-averse as she might have first guessed. ]

[scoutsniper]

[Yeah, sometimes he lets something slip like that--he's so busted. By himself. ]

Yeah, well, can't scowl forever. [Though he'd done a good job of it for most of the past month.]

[mucked]

It does get rather tiring, doesn't it? [ she seems to be speaking from experience. ] Not that I'm saying we should all go around holding hands and singing hymn -- far bloody from it.

[ this is about as near as she's gotten to a decent mood in a long while. it's strange to feel. ]

But this place does its best to beat us down. Maybe there's a speck of wisdom to be found in trying to resist it every now and then.

[scoutsniper]

Not sure you could get a lot of us to even do that.

[Frank...does not hold hands. Or sing. ]

I don't know. Wish I could figure out if this place wanted me to be miserable or happy; so I could give it the opposite of what it fucking wants.

[Combative: hard mode.]

[mucked]

[ -- a bit of a snort. trust, it was far from a serious suggestion. peggy is usually the more combative person in a given room. it's a weird kind of comfort to be outdone by others who manage to be more difficult. but, then again, she doesn't have quite as much reason to push back in a mansion where very few people overlook her for her gender. ]

It wants your memories. And I suspect it'll take them whatever way it can get them: happily or miserably.

[scoutsniper]

It seems to want some emotion, though. I mean, it's got to take a lot of effort to do all this crazy shit. If it was just memories they were after, why not take them all nice and peaceful like?

[Would Frank Castle be paranoid? Nahhh.]

[mucked]

I suppose -- I suppose we must ask ourselves if a peaceful extraction is even possible. [ conversation turns murky; it so often does. ] Like pulling the keystone out of an arch -- or, hell, any stone -- you do little more than guarantee instability.

[ she pauses. ]

Many believe that memories are integral to who we are. If that's the case, I can understand why 'all this crazy shit,' as you call it, might be the only means they've got.